Chapter 902: Directional Clues

In these two key parts of the outdoor investigation, Lu Chuan spent a lot of time, but correspondingly, he also obtained a lot of clues.

"Was the door locked at the time?"

Before entering the house, Lu Chuan carefully observed the condition of the door and found no signs of violent damage.

Zhao Zhigao shook his head; the door was one of the key parts they had examined at the time.

"The door wasn’t actually locked. We contacted the household that day; they had moved out of the village a month ago. All the valuable things in this house had been moved out, leaving only the items waiting for demolition."

Zhao Zhigao pointed to several other houses around that were almost yet to be demolished.

"Most of the surrounding households are like this too. If they locked them, the locks would cost money, so they didn’t bother and are just waiting for demolition."

Because the house was not particularly well-furnished.

Some newly built houses in the village, the owners would remove and sell the plastic steel windows and better doors.

Houses like this one generally have no demolition value, so they’re just left here.

"The door handle has been wiped, no fingerprints were collected."

This point is relatively easy to understand. If the killer hadn’t touched the door handle or treated it, there should have been fingerprints on it, although not necessarily the killer’s.

But since there are no fingerprints at all, it must have been wiped clean.

Opening the door, upon entering is the stove.

Even though five or six days have passed since the crime, Lu Chuan seemed to still faintly smell the scent of meat.

There was still blood inside the large iron pot, not completely cleaned.

"Was the blood volume in the pot tested at the time?"

Zhao Zhigao nodded: "The other party should have mixed the blood with water, otherwise it would have boiled dry long ago. When we arrived, the blood had somewhat taken on the appearance of blood tofu."

"But based on the iron content, we conducted some experiments, and we can basically determine it was the blood volume of an adult, thus confirming it was indeed human blood."

"It’s just that... because the blood had already been cooked, many biological characteristics had long disappeared, and we couldn’t determine the blood type. From our crime scene investigation perspective, we can’t determine the blood in the pot belonged to the deceased, Wang Jingya."

Zhao Zhigao said this to inform Lu Chuan that from the crime scene investigation’s point of view, there’s no concrete evidence supporting that the blood in the iron pot was Wang Jingya’s blood.

Of course, from logical deduction, it’s another situation.

With only one victim found at the crime scene, although the body and the blood are separate, logically deducing, the blood should be Wang Jingya’s.

"Director Zhao, lend me the ultraviolet light."

Lu Chuan came here naturally without all the prior investigation equipment himself, so he used the crime scene investigation equipment from Zhao Zhigao’s side.

Lu Chuan first swept the entire area around the stove with the ultraviolet light and found no bloodstains.

"Indeed, there are no bloodstains."

If the killer had bled Wang Jingya over the stove, letting the blood flow directly into the iron pot.

Then no matter how carefully the person handled it, theoretically, there would also be some blood spray outside the iron pot.

Even if the person was very careful and wiped it clean, blood cleaning can never completely eliminate it.

Even if it’s not visible on the surface, because blood contains a lot of iron, ions that are not chemically processed, the stain can be detected no matter how long the time has passed.

Zhao Zhigao truly admired Lu Chuan.

"Captain Lu, we scanned the entire room and didn’t find any bloodstains anywhere."

If it weren’t for Lu Chuan saying this wasn’t the primary crime scene, maybe no one would have thought of it.

But now, analyzing from a crime scene investigation perspective, it does seem that this might not be the primary crime scene; the killer likely killed the person elsewhere, then brought the blood and body to the village.

This would explain the pristine scene.

Hearing Zhao Zhigao’s words, Lu Chuan nodded but still held the ultraviolet scanner, carefully observing the house.

In crime scene investigation, everyone may come to different findings and conclusions.

So even though Zhao Zhigao mentioned it, Lu Chuan needed to see for himself; otherwise, his being there would have no meaning.

"Nothing has been moved at the scene, right?"

Zhao Zhigao nodded affirmatively: "Except for the deceased’s belongings being taken away, everything else has remained as it was, nothing has been moved at all."

After sweeping around with the ultraviolet scanning lamp and finding nothing, Lu Chuan returned the tool to Zhao Zhigao and started working on the edge of the stove.

Inside the stove area is a small stool; the killer probably sat on this small stool feeding firewood into the stove pit at that time.

Not far away, there was a pile of firewood that hadn’t fully burned out yet.

Lu Chuan sat down on the small stool, casually reaching out his left hand to the remaining pile of firewood.

With his height and arm length, he could easily reach the firewood.

After getting up, Lu Chuan recorded several numbers in his notebook.

Then Lu Chuan got busy in the indoor firewood pile.

Compared to the outdoor investigation, Lu Chuan was more meticulous this time.

He checked each remaining piece of wood and numbered them.

"Captain Lu... what are you doing?"

Zhao Zhigao had noticed this pile of firewood too but hadn’t done much detailed processing.

Without looking at Zhao Zhigao, Lu Chuan continued to busily work but casually explained.

"The killer should have a relatively strong anti-investigation awareness; we already observed inside, and it’s handled very cleanly, with no traces on the ground."

"Furthermore, the place on the edge of the heated brick bed where the deceased’s belongings were placed was also managed."

"But the killer slipped up in one place."

Zhao Zhigao then realized what Lu Chuan was focusing on the firewood: "You mean the firewood?"

Lu Chuan nodded.

"Yes, this pile of firewood."

The crime scene was basically two rooms; entering the door, there was a kitchen with a stove and a cupboard.

Originally, there might have been some water tanks and similar items, but they must have been taken by the original owners by now.

So, the house appeared very empty.

Lu Chuan pointed to a corner of the room.

"The original owners should have stacked firewood in that corner."

Due to long-term firewood stacking, the color of the floor in that area is different from other places, and there are already some remnants left there, which can be easily identified.